Natural Leadership
by roane
Summary: For Luke, being a leader means nothing more than anticipating the needs of the people he's leading, and doing his best to take care of them. When Leia reveals a side of herself he never expected, he discovers that those same skills translate outside of a hangar bay or a cockpit. (Luke/Leia, light bdsm)
Of all the surprising things Luke was learning about being a leader (him—a leader, how the hell had that happened?), the most surprising was how much of it involved taking care of other people.

Only slightly less surprising was realizing that he was good at it. When he'd been given Rogue Squadron, his biggest fear changed from letting down a superior officer to letting down the men in his command. The six of them had survived four missions so far. He was learning how to speak to them, both in the cockpit and in the landing bay, how to reassure, how to convince, how to give a kick in the ass when one was needed.

He'd heard someone call him a natural leader, and he'd felt vaguely guilty. It wasn't that, it was the Force. He could read Rogue Squadron, collectively and individually. He knew when Wedge was having a bout of homesickness for a place and for people that didn't exist anymore. He knew when Dak was on the verge of panic and fighting to hide it. The same was true for Zev, for Hobbie, for Wes. Most of the time, when he saw a problem that needed heading off, he relied on nothing more than the friendships he'd developed with each of them. But every once in a while, when that didn't work, he might give them a gentle mental nudge. Never enough to override their free will, just… a suggestion. A mood shift.

Overall, being a commander of a squadron was exhausting and exhilarating. And he'd never been happier.

For the most part. Since the rebels had moved to Hoth, there was an uneasy tension between him and Leia and Han. It didn't take the Force to see that the two of them were attracted to each other and fighting it tooth and nail. As for him, well… it was cold on Hoth. And boring. And the Alliance was comprised mainly of young, hot-blooded recruits. And if more than once after a dangerous mission Luke went back to his quarters to find Leia waiting there, that wasn't so surprising, was it? It had become almost a ritual, a desperate, adrenaline-fueled ritual that went back all the way to Yavin. They didn't talk about it. If anyone else knew about it, Luke hadn't heard the rumors. They were as discreet as it was possible to be on a military base.

Han was a puzzle Luke hadn't yet solved. He continually insisted that he was going to leave any day now, but had accepted the rank of Captain. He argued with Leia in lieu of flirting with her, and made moon eyes at her when he thought no one was looking. Luke felt like he was a pretty good judge of that, since he probably looked at her the same way. Thing was, Leia wasn't the only one that Han watched when he thought no one was looking. Luke had caught him looking away in a hurry on more than one occasion. He hadn't quite gotten up the nerve to call him on it yet.

So the three of them circled uneasily around one another, friends, lovers, would-be lovers.

Rogue Squadron had drawn patrol duty that day, and with the snow speeders still not ready for Hoth's frigid weather, the pilots were out on tauntauns. For a desert boy like Luke, it was the closest thing to hell he could imagine. Before Hoth, he hadn't realized it was possible to be so cold and still live. Nonetheless, he worked to keep up everyone's spirits.

"Rogue Leader," Wedge's voice came over the comms.

"Copy, Rogue Three," Luke answered, reining in his tauntaun.

"Tell us the truth. The speeders are ready aren't they—this is all just some sort of crazy-ass character building exercise the general came up with, isn't it?"

Luke grinned, his face aching from the cold despite all the gear he had on. "I'm afraid that information's on a need to know basis, Rogue Three. I _can_ say that you're all responding within the accepted parameters."

Five answering groans sounded. "Commander, we've been patrolling for weeks and nobody's found any sign of life, how much longer is this going to go on?"

"Just until the speeders are ready." Luke paused long enough to hear a sigh of relief over the comms, then added, "Then we'll patrol by air."

Complaints started up again, and he gave them a moment vent before cutting it off. "All right, boys. The sooner you finish your circuits, the sooner you can get back to base."

The mood at Echo Base was considerably lighter when they regrouped. Luke was able to improve it still further with the news that the speeders were expected to be ready any day now. Endless patrols might not be fun, but better in a heated speeder than on a tauntaun's back.

Luke checked in on Artoo, then headed back to his quarters, whistling to himself. He punched in the keycode for the door, and when it slid open it revealed Leia, pacing what little floor space there was. Her agitation slammed into him even before she looked up at him with wild eyes. He closed the door behind him and hurried to her.

"Leia, what's wrong?"

Leia didn't answer at first, then crossed the space between them and buried her face against his chest.

"Hey." Luke's first instinct was to look her in the eye, but something told him that wasn't the right course of action. Instead he put his arms around her. "What is it?"

"I can't do this." Leia's voice was muffled against his chest, and at first he thought he'd heard her wrong. He'd never known her to say that about anything. "I need to be in two places at once and it's too much."

Luke sat down on the only chair in his quarters and pulled her onto his lap, still letting her curl against him. "Tell me what's going on."

"Everything that's going on here with the Rebellion—I still don't know exactly how I fit in. You have a rank, hell, even _Han_ has a rank, but no one seems to know where a princess of a place that doesn't exist anymore shows up in the chain of command."

"But everyone listens to you—"

"Sure, and thinks I know what I'm doing." She was still on edge. Talking wasn't working. There was something else, something beneath the surface that he could almost sense.

"What's happening with the Alderaan refugee project?" As soon as he said it, he realized he'd hit the core of what was troubling her.

Leia shook her head. "I can't talk about that right now. I can't _think_ about it right now." She lifted her head finally and met his eyes. "My mind won't stop spinning in circles." He saw the shadows on her face and wondered how long it had been since she'd slept.

"Make me stop thinking." The edge in her voice caught him off-guard. She wasn't just asking for sex, although he recognized the heat in her eyes. He thought about his men, how he read them to figure out what they needed. Leia leaned in and kissed him, and as his eyes closed, he felt for her thoughts.

He saw what she was hesitant to ask for, saw what she hoped would drive thought from her mind. _Startled_ was one word for how he felt. _Intrigued_ was another.

Leia reached for her jacket and started to shrug out of it, but Luke caught her by the wrists. "Not yet."

Her heartbeat skipped and there was a flare in her mind. She didn't fight him, but looked at him with wide eyes. Then she nodded, and Luke felt the 'yes' as clearly as he saw it. Leia lowered her hands to her lap. Her hair was wrapped around her head in a braid, and Luke reached up, feeling for the pins that held it in place. Leia started to protest, but he raised an eyebrow at her and she stopped, ducking her head to make it easier for him to reach. Once the braid was uncoiled, he brought it over her shoulder and started from the end, unplaiting it and combing it out with his fingers.

Taking down her hair was instinct; she was more vulnerable that way, and right now vulnerable was what he was aiming for. He curled his fingers around a lock of it and looked up at her to find her staring at him intently.

"All you have to say is 'stop', and I will," he said.

"I know. That's why I came to you." The amount of trust she was putting in him—both to let him see this side of her and to put herself in his hands—threatened to floor him. He pulled her toward him by her hair, not only fierce enough to earn a wince, but enough that he could read what sort of wince it was. Her lips met his again and the only thing he sensed from her was 'more'.

Causing her pain deliberately, even on her request, even knowing that it was what she wanted, maybe even needed, him to do—that was going to be a struggle.

He started small, sliding his hand deeper into her hair and tightening his fingers. Leia gasped against his mouth and a tiny bit of tension drained away from her. Luke's mind whirred, caught in a loop of listening to everything coming from her and trying to figure out what to do next. He understood—the smallest bit—how this worked, if only from way too much time listening to pilots brag, but this was different. This was Leia, and she wasn't looking for something different and fun. _Make me stop thinking_ , she'd said.

To do that, a part of him would have to stop thinking too. Luke pushed her—gently—off his lap. "Get undressed, please." Possibly he would have sounded more authoritative without the 'please', but he couldn't bring himself to be brusque with her, not yet. He sat back and folded his arms, keeping his eyes on her face at first.

Leia lowered her head and started to obey, her hair falling around her shoulders and concealing her.

"Eyes up, please." Luke kept his voice soft, but recognized an attempt to hide when he saw it.

Her cheeks were pink when she raised her head, her trembling fingers still moving to peel off layer after layer of her winter clothing. Of course he was aroused—she'd never done anything like this for him before. Normally they undressed each other with frantic speed, nothing so slow and deliberate. The vulnerability he'd been trying to reach radiated off her and it wrapped around his heart like a fist.

Luke stood up and reached out to cover her hands with his. "Leia?"

She met his eyes. "Don't stop."

"I don't know if I can hurt you," he admitted, trailing his fingers down her cheek.

"If you can't, you don't have to." Leia looked away and he resisted the urge to turn her back to him, giving her this moment to retreat. "Just… control me."

His breath caught in his throat. "All right." He did lift her chin to face him then and kissed her hard, following it up with a small nip of her lower lip. "Finish undressing."

She did, and when she was done, stood shivering in the center of his room. Her skin was almost as pale as the icy walls of the base, prickled with gooseflesh, her nipples hard with a combination of the cold and the arousal he sensed from her. She wasn't alone there; he was getting harder by the moment, and it wasn't just from seeing her naked. There was more, the subtle shift of power was new, and left him torn between his natural instinct to protect and a different, darker urge, to take—and knew that was the path she wanted him to follow.

Instead of steering her toward the bed, he crowded her toward the nearest wall, using the small height advantage he had, finally caging her against it with his arms. The wall was freezing and would be uncomfortable. Leia shivered against it, looking up at him. As he bent down the closed the distance between them, he caught her hands in his and pulled them over her head. Their bodies pressed together from fingertips down to their toes and he leaned in to nuzzle along the line of her neck. When he lowered his hands, she tried to follow suit and couldn't, a small whimper escaping her as she tested the invisible bonds holding her in place. Luke smiled against her neck and curled his hands around her hips to bring her in tight against him, wrapping her legs around his.

Leia shivered and gave soft gasps as he nipped at her neck before biting harder, mouthing at her skin like something dangerous and predatory. At that, she arched violently, and the rolling surge of _need_ that came from her mind threatening to knock him back. Something in him answered and he growled in her ear, shoving her back against the wall and biting her again, needing suddenly to leave a mark on her skin.

There was a small thread of fear in Leia's mind now, and it almost stopped him short, until he followed that thread, listened to it, and realized with a start that the fear was part of what she wanted, that tiny bit of uncertainty. He slid his hands up her body, cupping her breasts with a little more roughness than normal.

"You came to me because you know I _can_ control you," he murmured in her ear, feeling her squirm against him. Her skin was chilled silk beneath his fingertips. "But that's not what you need."

"Luke, please…" Leia shuddered and the pleading note in her voice nearly made him cave in, to do anything she wanted. The irony was, what she wanted was for him not to do what she wanted. Not yet.

"You don't need to be controlled. You need to obey." He drew back to look at her, trailing one thumb over her nipple to watch her shiver harder. Again the sense of 'yes' came from her and despite her quivering, some of the abnormal tension had left her shoulders. He released her hands and put her down, then stepped back. She met his eyes and for the moment the two of them hovered at the edge of a precipice.

 _Don't think, just act_.

Luke took a breath and stepped off that edge. "Get on your knees, princess."

As soon as he said it, he half-expected to be struck down for his blasphemy, but no—Leia fell to her knees so hard and so fast he worried that she'd hurt herself. He had his first glimpse of the power in the profane. That she, of all people, should be kneeling at his feet was indescribably wrong, but that very wrongness stole his breath away and burned into his brain.

Leia looked up at him, her eyes wide and dark and beautiful, waiting for him to command her. For a second it was like the first time he led a mission—he had no idea what to do. He couldn't think with her looking at him like that.

"Close your eyes."

She did, and it got easier. He closed his as well and took a deep breath, focusing on her, reaching into her mind to find that intersection between what she feared and what she wanted. Interesting. She was already struggling to keep her eyes closed; just giving up even that much control made her uneasy.

"I can blindfold you, if you'd rather. But I think you're stronger than that."

Leia whimpered, barely audible even in the quiet of his room. He reached out and touched her cheek, and she jumped at the touch. He understood two things then, that it would be easier for her if she were bound and blindfolded—and that _easier_ wasn't what she wanted.

"Put your hands behind your back."

When she did, he couldn't help but admire the way her back arched, her body curving forward on display, reminding him of his own desire in a single heated rush. Luke walked around her in a silent circle, touching her randomly: a caress of her shoulder, a finger trailed over the nape of her neck, once, a teasing pinch to one nipple. As he watched, Leia started to struggle to keep her eyes closed; her discomfort at not being able to see him, not being able to tell where he was or where he would touch her next, was a palpable thing.

On a whim, he stepped away from her entirely, folded his arms, and just watched her. Watching her was something he never got tired of, and he seldom had the chance to do it away from public eyes. He'd never dreamed of seeing her this way, kneeling, naked, vulnerable, the bite mark he'd left on her neck livid against her skin. It had never occurred to him to _want_ to see her this way, but something about it twisted his insides and left him torn between comforting her and making it worse.

At first, she held still, but as the minutes passed, he could see her eyes moving behind her eyelids, barely-perceptible movements of her head as she tried to figure out where he'd gone. He could read her tension even without the Force, and waited for instinct to tell him the precise right moment before she reached the tipping point into the wrong kind of discomfort.

When that moment came, he spoke softly. "Open your eyes and come here."

She started to get to her feet, stopping when he gave a minute shake of his head. Luke held his breath as Leia crawled across the icy floor on her hands and knees. It was too much for him. He crouched as she reached him, and pulled her into his arms. "You're doing very well."

She sagged against him, the tension draining away. Her body was icy and she was shivering with the cold. He stood up and helped her to her feet, leading her to his bed. "Get under the covers." It was heated against Hoth's unending cold, but it would take time to get warm. He quickly undressed and crawled in after her, pulling her into his arms. She was still cold enough to make him shiver, and he chafed at her back with his hands, trying to create heat.

Their lips met, and for all his intentions of making it a tender kiss, it caught fire faster than that, and ended with her on her back and him on top, pinning her arms again. A shift of their hips, one quick motion, and he could be inside her. She was ready for that, and he was so ready for it the top of his head was about to come off, but—no.

Her mind was clearer than it was when he'd first found her here, but he could still feel the outside world pulling at the corners of her thoughts, and he wanted to finish driving them away.

Bracing on his elbows, he smiled down at her. "Leia?"

"Hm?" Her beautiful eyes were heavy-lidded and her smile slow and sweet enough to take his breath away.

"Stay quiet. No matter what, or else I'll stop."

Leia raised an eyebrow, looking for a moment like her usual self. One maddening thing about her and their current situation was that no matter what, she was almost always entirely silent in bed, the result of barrack living and a desire to be discreet. Half the time they were together was playfully spent with him trying to get her to make some noise, _any_ noise, and her trying to make him be quieter. As a result, he knew a few surefire ways to make her more vocal.

Luke kissed her then ducked beneath the covers. He felt her intake of breath as she realized his challenge might be more difficult than she'd thought. She gathered her focus as he kissed the tips of her nipples, feeling her skin warm beneath his hands and his mouth. This was easy for her; she squirmed, but silently. As his mouth and hands slid inexorably lower, her squirming took on an edge of urgency. He pinned her hips in place with his hands and trailed long, slow kisses over the softness of her belly, then to her parted thighs.

He heard a frustrated exhale, but figured that didn't count, since it was unvocalized. Still made him grin though, and he nipped at her thigh before bringing up her knees, tilting her hips up so he could reach everywhere he wanted to. Luke knew from experience that the longer he teased her, the more likely she was to make noise. So at first, he barely trailed his fingers over the dark brown curls of her pubic hair, nuzzling at her thighs with his nose. If he'd had any doubt how aroused she was before, that doubt was gone now. The wetness was on her thighs as well as her hair and he couldn't resist dragging his tongue through it.

Leia jumped, her hips jerking forward. He pushed them back down again. "Hold still." She immediately stilled. "Careful, I could get used to this," he teased. She started to respond. "Uh-uh. No sound."

She huffed out her breath in annoyance, but the annoyance vanished when he trailed his fingers up the curve of her labia, barely parting them. He sensed her anticipation—he always did, but with the added challenge to stay quiet, everything was heightened.

His determination to tease her faded quickly as the taste of her flooded his tongue. Restraint went out the window whenever he got his mouth on her. Maybe that was why he was able to make her cry out this way, his own loss of control spurring hers. He buried his face between her legs, one hand curled tight into her thigh, his other holding her open for him. As aroused as they both were, she was soon bucking and squirming, her hands curling into fists in the covers.

Every movement he made to torment her was just as much a torment for him. Tasting her, sliding his fingers into her, made him forget he'd ever wanted anything in his life other than her. A new tension was rising in her, a better one than before. She was so close, and then—

Leia whimpered. "Luke, _please._ "

Pulling away from her was sheer hell, but he'd promised.

"No, please." She was reaching for him and well—he'd said he would stop. He had. So now he could do something different.

He crawled up the length of her body until he reached her mouth. The shift in mood was apparent when she pulled him down to kiss her. He wasn't in charge anymore. Not entirely.

Sliding into her was one of the purest forms of bliss he'd ever known. Better than flying, and before he'd met her, he would've said nothing was better than flying. No matter who else on the base he'd spent the occasional night with, no one was like her. They _fit_ , in every way imaginable. Sometimes he would've sworn she was inside his head.

Just because he could, he twined his fingers with hers, pressing them back to the bed. Leia's smile was soft-edged and bright as they rocked together, eventually warm enough that they kicked off the covers.

As in sync as they always were, her orgasm brought on his, and she kissed him to keep him quiet. Finally they lay curled together and Luke pulled the blankets back up over them both, nuzzling the top of Leia's head. Her mind was quiet now, he sensed that with a deep feeling of satisfaction.

"Better?" he asked.

"Yes." Her face was pressed against his chest, but her voice was off somehow. He pulled away to get a clearer look at her.

"Are you sure?"

She smiled, but her cheeks were pink. "I just—I don't think I could have asked anyone else to do that."

He ducked his head, as if some of her sudden shyness were rubbing off on him. "I don't know that I could do it for anyone else."

"I don't know, it's a small base. I've heard stories about you." She grinned, and looked more herself than she had since he'd come home. "So drop the shy farmboy act, I don't buy it anymore."

"It's not an act!"

"Oh, don't get me wrong, it _works_ , I'm sure of that." Leia was laughing at him with her eyes. "It worked on me." She cupped his cheek with her hand. "You have changed though."

"We both have."

"No, I mean it. You're not going to be a commander for long. You're too good at this. You know what people need."

Luke made a face, uncomfortable. "You know how."

"How doesn't matter. The Alliance needs more people like you"—she smiled—"and I don't mean Jedi."

"Shy farmboys?" he hazarded.

"Stop dodging the compliment. Leaders. We need more leaders." She started to say something else, but her words were cut off with a startled yawn.

"How long has it been since you slept?" he asked gently.

"Too long," she admitted.

"Stay."

It was an impulsive request, and he doubted she'd agree. Before they'd always made a point to never be seen leaving the other's quarters at a questionable hour. Staying until morning, taking a chance that someone might see the last princess of Alderaan leaving Commander Skywalker's quarters bright and early, disheveled and sleepy-eyed… that was a step he wasn't sure she'd take.

"All right." Leia snuggled against his shoulder, her eyes already closing.

Luke rested his cheek against the top of her head, knowing he'd be awake for hours yet, trying to figure her out.


End file.
